The upper war chamber of Emberleaf wasn't designed for visionaries. It had been a weather-worn strategy room, once used to store broken spears and old banners. But now, the floor was swept clean, the stone walls polished, and every inch of the table at the center was smothered in scrolls, charcoal sketches, and glowing rune-paper. The air smelled of ink, flame powder, and roasted yam crackers — thanks to Rimuru.

Kael stood at the head of the table, sleeves rolled, a stylus twirling between his fingers. His cloak lay folded across the back of his chair — he wasn't here as the Scourge of Wrath. He was here as the builder of something new.

"This is it," Kael said, eyes bright. "This is how we stop being a miracle and start becoming a nation."

A hush fell over the room. Nana shifted beside him, arms folded, her glaive propped against the wall. Gobtae, Gobrinus, and Zelganna crowded the far side of the table, necks craning as they tried to decode the web of notes and magical diagrams. Rimuru, hovering above the center of the table like a lazy sunspot, slowly rotated and hummed.

Kael tapped one massive blueprint with the stylus. "Three towns. Fully operational within five seasons. Stonecross to the east, guarding the river bend. Verdencross in the south near the trade fork. Solaris Point west, where the cliffs hold high mana wind currents."

Zelganna raised a brow. "You named them already?"

Kael nodded. "Names shape identity. And I don't want to build outposts—I want to build homes."

Gobtae scratched his head. "So what's this string of… fire noodles?"

"That," Kael said, amused, "is Project Emberline. A fast-rail system. Powered by compressed flame runes. It will connect the three towns and Emberleaf—like veins, carrying goods, soldiers, messages… even citizens."

Rimuru bounced twice and splashed against the blueprint, forming a curvy slime trail around the tracks. "BoomRoad," she declared, voice syrupy with pride.

Kael blinked. "No. Emberline."

"BoomRoad."

"Emberline."

Rimuru's glow intensified slightly. "BoomRoad."

A pause.

"…Fine," Kael sighed. "We'll put BoomRoad on the promotional fliers. Emberline stays in the archives."

Great Sage: "Dual designation indexed. Marketing alias: BoomRoad. Strategic infrastructure: Emberline. Tactical efficiency increased by 7.4% due to branding compromise."

"See?" Rimuru whispered. "Even Sage gets it."

Kael rolled his eyes but returned to the main diagram, unrolling another parchment — this one a vertical cutaway showing a glowing sphere surrounded by runic rings.

"This is our heart," he said. "The mana condenser chamber beneath Emberleaf. We've stabilized the flame core and routed channel flows. With enough reinforcement, it can power the entire region — and more."

He reached under the pile and slid forward a smaller parchment — an elegant sketch of a short-barreled magical weapon. Compact. Elementally reactive. Triggered with glyph-ink signatures and sparkstone chambers.

"This is Project Blazegun," Kael said. "A tool for magically capable soldiers to project mana as high-speed bursts. No chanting. No casting delay. Just pure, efficient deterrence. Anyone trained in fire or spark can use one."

Rimuru tried to pick up the blueprint with a slime tendril. "Pew! Blam! Zzt!"

"Please stop," Kael muttered.

Nana gave a quiet smirk. "She's not wrong. If they see what we're making, no one's going to laugh at us again."

Kael glanced across the table.

Three towns. A rail network. A new weapon. A new world.

He felt the weight of it — and the thrill.

"They'll come at us eventually," he said. "We need to be ready. Not just to survive… but to define what kind of kingdom we're becoming."

Rimuru floated closer, her glow warm and gentle. "Then let's draw it right."

Kael smiled.

And they began to write.

The war room had quieted, but Kael didn't dismiss anyone. Instead, he unrolled a fresh scroll—this one blank, except for one symbol at the top: a burning crown.

"This next part," he said, "isn't about walls or roads or weapons. It's about people."

The goblins exchanged glances. Nana crossed her arms again. Rimuru, still glowing, tilted thoughtfully in the air.

"We've done the impossible," Kael continued. "We've built something from ash. But it can't just run on my ideas forever. We need a council—people who know how to lead, how to listen, and how to make this kingdom more than me."

He took a stick of red wax and began carving names into the scroll. Each stroke glowed faintly, reacting to his mana.

Nana – Marshal of Emberleaf. In charge of internal defense, strategy, and militia development.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Zelganna – Chief of Development. Oversees construction, materials, and village architecture. Gobrinus – Minister of Trade and Beastkin Relations. Handles supply lines, exports, and foreign monsterfolk diplomacy. Gobtae – General of Infrastructure. Manages roads, the Emberline, and regional mana tower expansion. Rimuru – Director of Magical R&D. Unofficial title: "Boom Director." Kael – High Steward of Emberleaf. Final vote, but only if there's a tie.

Zelganna blinked. "Wait, wait. You're putting goblins… on an actual ruling council?"

"Why not?" Kael asked.

Gobtae grinned. "So… do we get cloaks?"

"No."

"Badges?"

"No."

Rimuru floated down. "Cookies?"

"…maybe."

Great Sage: "Recommended assignment of council chambers: west tower annex. Room capacity: 14. Emergency war table access: approved."

Nana leaned forward. "And when the nobles hear about this?"

"They'll lose their minds," Kael said with a grin. "But they'll also see that we're not waiting for permission."

The scroll shimmered. The names etched into it began to glow, signaling a living contract—a binding of title, magic, and shared purpose. Each one would be tracked by mana signature and sealed into Emberleaf's recognition ledger.

The goblins stared at it in stunned silence.

Kael turned to face them. "You helped build this place. You bled for it. You've earned more than jobs—you've earned a voice. I won't lead alone. Not anymore."

Gobrinus stepped forward and placed a hand over his own glowing name.

One by one, the others followed.

Even Rimuru plopped her core right on the scroll and left behind a little star-shaped slime print that shimmered pink for a moment.

Kael looked around the room, then nodded. "This is how it starts."

And for the first time, Emberleaf had a real council.

The council chamber gradually emptied, its earlier buzz fading into the hush of stone and flame. Chairs scraped, boots echoed, murmurs retreated. Eventually, only Kael remained—still seated at the far end of the obsidian inlay table where blueprints and declarations had moments ago stirred a room to life.

Now, the room was quiet.

A low wind slipped through the open windows, carrying with it the mingled scents of moss-damp earth, faint forge smoke, and the wild floral musk of Emberleaf's outer cliffs. The rune-lit walls pulsed gently with warm orange tones, like a heartbeat slowed to rest.

Kael stood slowly, his hand brushing over the notes and sketches they'd drawn. Cities that didn't exist yet. Towns barely more than names. A weapon foundry etched in dream-smoke. Emberline—his audacious plan for a transport system that, if successful, would reshape their economy, their reach… their future.

Yet in the stillness, the weight pressed down.

No applause. No cheering. Just… the silence between breaths.

Great Sage: "Emotional fatigue detected. Elevated cortisol markers. Would you like to initiate a stabilization protocol?"

Kael didn't answer immediately. He walked toward the wide arched window at the rear of the chamber—the one that faced the western edge of Emberleaf.

Beyond the rooftops and market towers, the horizon dipped into a faded bruise of purple and grey. Shadows pooled at the base of the mountains. And just at the edge of vision, like a smear of regret, the ruins of the Ashen Trail lay dormant. Blackened trees. Collapsed archways. The ghosts of a border no one had dared reclaim—until now.

Kael let his fingers brush the edge of the stone window ledge, smooth and cool.

"What if all I'm doing is rebuilding something meant to stay dead?" he thought.

"What if my flame only burns it all down again?"

Behind him, boots echoed softly on the polished floor.

Nana didn't speak at first. She moved to his side, arms crossed, one hand resting lightly on the pommel of her glaive. Her presence, solid and unshaken, grounded the air between them.

"You think too loud," she said finally, her voice low, not teasing this time.

Kael exhaled a slow breath, not quite a sigh.

"I just…" He paused. "I thought I'd feel better seeing the plan finished."

She tilted her head. "You don't build a kingdom in a day. Or a week. Or in one good meeting. You build it in fire, and ash, and hope. Over and over."

He glanced over. "That supposed to be comforting?"

A third presence arrived—less subtle, more spherical.

Rimuru floated in from the far archway, hovering upside down as if offended by gravity itself. Her glow was dimmed for once, a soft gold-flecked amber like a lantern through fog.

"If you start monologuing, I'm jumping off this windowsill," she muttered, wiggling like a wobbling halo. "And calling dibs on your sword."

Kael smiled faintly. The ache didn't vanish, but it eased.

Great Sage: "Humor acknowledged. Mental strain lowering. Emotional stabilization underway."

He looked back to the horizon. The forge smoke. The fields. The shadowed ruins.

"I don't care if anyone remembers my name," he said. "I just want this place to live longer than I do."

Nana nodded once, solemn. "Then stop standing in the dark. Emberleaf doesn't follow ghosts."

"And don't forget," Rimuru added, flipping upright, "step one of kingdom expansion—no brooding allowed."

Kael chuckled under his breath.

Then he turned from the window, letting the shadows fall behind him.

He walked back to the center of the room—not with a grin, not with a rallying cry, but with steady feet and steady breath.

Because a blueprint was only the beginning.

And tomorrow… the building would begin.

Morning crept into Emberleaf with golden mist threading between the trees, catching on rooftops and banners like threads of woven light. The square outside the eastern workshop hummed with anticipation—low voices, clinking tools, and the occasional curse from goblin engineers fine-tuning something overly ambitious.

Inside the workshop, it was organized chaos.

Mana crystals glowed in containment rings. Fireproofed scrolls lay spread across six tables. Gears, rune-stamped plates, and wireframes of experimental constructs filled every available surface. The entire room thrummed with energy—not magical, but imaginative. The kind that comes before invention.

Kael stood near the center of it all, squinting at a half-done schematic.

"This… is not what I drew."

"You drew a rectangle on a hill and called it a train," Rimuru replied, floating upside down and tapping the blueprints with a tiny slime tendril. "We've been forced to improvise."

Nearby, three goblins were arguing over combustion flow runes versus slow-burn mana capsules.

"We can't detonate the passengers!" one hissed.

"Only a little!" another argued. "Just enough to go fwoosh, not boom! That's why it's called BoomRoad!"

Kael rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I was hoping for… I don't know, a quiet name. Emberline. Sounds efficient. Fast. Safe."

Rimuru rotated smugly in the air. "Sounds boring. Also, I already filed a prototype registry under BoomRoad. With the art."

"The what?"

She popped into a hovering slideshow of chalk-drawn images:

A slime conductor with a flaming scarf.

A flaming rollercoaster over a canyon.

A goblin riding the train backward, screaming "I regret nothing!"

"…We have branding," she said proudly.

Kael stared at her for a long moment.

Then sighed. "Fine. BoomRoad can be the working name. But if nobles ask, it's Emberline."

Nana entered through the rear entrance, eyebrows raised at the mess. "Are you planning to weaponize public transit?"

"Only a little," Rimuru chirped.

Kael pointed to the latest model—an open-top rail cart run by compressed flame glyphs. "Right now, I just want it to not explode before leaving the station."

A burst of sparks flared from one corner. A goblin yelped. Everyone ducked instinctively.

"…Progress," Nana said dryly.

Kael grinned. "One fireproof milestone at a time."

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